Adept Quest
by lilepdude
Summary: Part 1 starts with a girl and her master accidentally realeasing the fourth prime evil, the outcast. Part 2 focuses on a new hero, who finds the truth about Slater. Part 3 takes place ten thousand years later. To read it, find The Cleansing.
1. Act I

Act I

"Ready Slater? This will be your first true battle." "O.K. Lile, I'm ready, let's go." Slater and Lile descend into the cave and immediately begin to destroy everything. "Wow Lile, you're strong! Hey! I found a spell book!" Lile smiles and looks for a moment at the simple spells that Slater is in awe of. "Thanks, and good job Slater." They continue on, diminishing the demons hopes of a mass attack on the encampment. As the last demon dies, making a large bloody explosion, the cave begins to shake. "Oh no, they're summoning it…" "Huh? What's wrong Lile?" "RUN!" Slater runs towards the back exit. "AAARRGH!" "Lile! What's wrong!" Slater realizes that Lile is nowhere to be found. "Lile, hurry!" She runs out of the cave, watching it collapse as she turns around outside of it. "Lile, my master…" Suddenly a wolf appears, killing enemies with its claws, nearing Slater. "Lile! Help!" she closes her eyes, fearing her life was about to end. A few moments later she opens her eyes and sees a druid in front of her. "Sorry to scare you sorceress." "Uh, no problem, I'm Slater, who're you?" "That's not important, just call me druid." "Err… O.K., well, druid, my master has disappeared, can you please help me find her?" "Sure, what's her name?" "Lile." "THE Lile! How could SHE be captured?" "You know her?" "She was my master as well, we must go to the monastery and pray that we can win a battle such as this." "Whatever you say druid, I wouldn't know where else to search." The two continue on to the Tamoe Highlands, reaching them that night. "The monastery is not far now, it's just across this area." "O.K." "The monastery was once my home, Lile lived there as well once we saved her from a wolf. Then Andariel, the "Queen of Anguish", the first of the four lesser evils, attacked." "…" "My first goal is to defeat her and her tainted army, and then I will help you." "Sure druid…" The two of them continue to the monastery. "Druid, this place seems like a place from a dream I had once, I led an army of demons to destroy this place, but it seemed so real." "Hmmm…" They continue through the barracks and past the jailing areas, killing many demons along the way. They go up the stairs and enter the inner cloister. "Finally, the altar is just through this door." They continue through the altar room, once again, killing more demons. They reach the altar not long after. "O.K, Allow me a moment to pray." "Druid, that altar seems tainted by evil." "I must risk it, I need the strength to defeat Andariel." The druid kneels on the floor and begins to pray at the altar. When suddenly, the room starts to rumble and the ceiling begins to break, fireballs start falling from where the bricks had been and are barely missing Slater and the druid. "ARGH!" "Druid?" The door is blocked off and the druid is kneeling on the ground holding his head, the room begins to shake more violently than before. "Druid! What's going on!" A brick from the roof falls and hits Slater on the head and she blacks out. Later, when she awakes, everything is calm, the door is still blocked and the druid is nowhere to be seen. "What the heck happened?" Slater looks around the destroyed room, all she can find is a stairway leading downwards. "I suppose I'm going down." She heads down the stairs, is immediately ambushed by a small clan of demons, making quick work of them, she continues on through what appears to be some type of catacombs, fighting many demons along the way. She is beginning to lose hope, but then she sees the druid standing in the corner of a room, facing the wall. "Druid? Are you O.K.?" He transforms himself into a bear-like creature. "Druid!" He begins to chase her. They run all around, and then reach some stairs leading downwards, Slater jumps down them. The druid walks away. "Huh? Why'd he stop chasing me?" She walks back up the stairs. The druid is gone. "…?" Slater goes back down and continues on, she goes down two more flights of stairs, where she reaches a burning room; she goes through the only door there, everything inside is on the ground, dead. "Huh? What happened here?" Then she spots the druid lying behind some barrels in the corner of the room. "Druid!" The druid stands up slowly and stares at Slater, and then a loud voice is heard. "HAVING FUN SORCERESS?" "NO! Do I look like it! Wait, who said that?" "THAT IS NOT OF IMPORTANCE…BUT, HOW COULD YOU CONTINUE ON, REALISING HOW EASILY I TOOK OVER YOUR FRIENDS MIND, OR ARE YOU SIMPLY DIM AND DID NOT REALISE IT AT ALL?" "…" "WELL, EITHER WAY, YOU DIE NOW." The druid becomes the bear-man again and jumps at Slater, entirely missing her, continuously swiping at her, missing every shot. "WHAT? HOW IS HE MISSING? THE ANGEL?" "What do you mean?" "NOTHING!" The druid collapses on the ground back in his human form. "What the heck? Where am I?" "You were tainted-" "Explain later, I recognize this place, Andariel lives here, she will die now!" "OK?" Slater quirks an eyebrow at the druid and then prepares for the fight about to take place. "Here we go Slater." The druid opens the door and is immediately knocked back into the wall. "Ready to die?" Andariel runs up to them with her claws raised and swipes at Slater, leaving a large gash in her shoulder. "Feel that sorceress? Poison is quite amazing, eh?" Slater's vision begins to blur and she collapses. "Ready to fight one on one druid?" "Whatever Andariel, just be ready to die." The druid jumps at Andariel, slashing at her throat, she dodges it and laughs. "Nice try druid." "Grr…whatever, you got lucky that time." "Heh, luck had nothing to do with it." Andariel tackles the druid and pins him to the ground. "Now, it's over druid, you die now!" Andariel lifts her poisonous claws and smirks. "See ya Andariel." Andariel turns around to look at who had said that but instead sees a fireball flying towards her face, which ignites on contact it. "AHH! NO!" Andariel falls face first onto the ground, incinerated by the blazing fire. The druid is amazed and when he sits up, sees Slater wobbling around on her legs. "Slater? Are you O.K.?" Slater falls to her knees smiling at the druid and then falls forward onto the ground in a green haze. "Slater!" The druid runs up to Slater. "No! I can never forgive myself knowing I allowed Lile's apprentice to die!" "Druid?" "Huh, you're alive? How?" "I-I'm not sure." "SLATER, YOU ARE THE CHOSEN ONE, YOU WILL NOT DIE UNTIL YOUR QUEST IS COMPLETE, ALL EIGHT EVILS MUST FALL!" "Huh? Who're you!" "Slater? Are you talking to me?" "No druid, I was talking to that voice." "Err, what voice?" "How could you not hear it!" "Whatever Slater, meet me in Lut Gohlein, I believe that's where Lile was taken." "Sure Druid, I'll see you there."


	2. Act II

Act II

Slater walks back to the encampment, facing little resistance compared to when she had been going towards the monastery. Once she gets there, she gets aboard the next caravan heading East to Lut Gohlein. She's greeted by a woman named Atma the second she gets off. "Slater, I have heard stories of your victory over Andariel, I need your help." "OK, what's the problem?" "There's a beast in the sewers, he is attempting to free Baal from his seal, you must destroy him." "Who's Baal?" "So strong and yet so little knowledge, he is the middle brother of the three prime evils." "The evils, my quest is to destroy them." "Well, you've defeated one already." Atma walks away slowly. Slater finds the druid not long after. "Druid, we must go to the sewers." "What for?" "There's a monster in there attempting to free Baal." "Baal? Let's go." The two of them head into the sewers. After hours of almost non-stop fighting and descending two more floors, they find a large monster with a skull over its face and a sickle for a hand. "Here we go Slater, let's kick some butt!" The druid rushes at Radament and makes a sharp turn left when he reaches him; Radament soon realizes that the druid was only a distraction when a large ball of lightning hits him in the stomach. "Good team work druid." Radament falls to his knees, holding his stomach. The druid runs up to him and cuts off his head. "Heh, simple." "GOOD JOB SORCERESS." "Huh? You again?" "YES, IT'S ME, BAAL. RADAMENT WAS THE ONE BEING PREVENTING MY FREEDOM, AHAHAHA!" "Preventing? What do you mean? Atma said that he was attempting to free you!" "I HAD POSSESSED THAT WOMAN, EVEN SEALED I HAVE ENOUGH POWER FOR SOMETHING AS SIMPLE AS THAT, AND YOU ACTUALLY TRUSTED A COMPLETE STRANGER, FOOLISH." The area is entirely silent. "Slater? What's the problem?" "Baal, we unsealed him, he is too clever for us." "Hmmm, we must be sure this is the truth, he was sealed in the tomb of Tal Rasha, it won't be easy to get there." "It doesn't matter, I must know." The two of them begin to travel through the desert less than an hour later. The journey is silent until they reach a big hole in the ground. "This is it Slater." "…and this is what?" "This is a sand maggot lair, not just any lair though. This one has an artifact at the bottom of it that we require if we have any hope of reaching Tal Rasha's Tomb." "Ok then Druid, let's go." The two of them go into the hole and are almost immediately surrounded by large bugs that squirt a strange green slime from their mouths. "Careful Slater, they won't hesitate to eat us." "What'll we do Druid?" Slater attempts to back away." The druid smirks. "Don't worry Slater, we'll squish them like the bugs they are." The druid rips the maggots apart quickly with his claws. "See? Just as I said." Slater smiles. "Ok Druid, lead the way." The two make their way to the lowest floor of the maggot lair. There, they find a maggot at least ten times the size of the others. "Druid? What's this?" The druid makes a strange face at the creature. "This Slater, is the hard part. This is the queen of the maggots here. I'll take care of her alone, do you see that chest over there to her left side?" Slater looks to the left. "Yes?" "There's a shaft of a staff in there, that's what we're looking for, run over there and get it." The druid rushes the maggot, slicing as fast as he can manage. The queen summons maggots from throughout the lair to her aid. The druid holds them off as best he can, but concentrates on the queen. She's quickly beginning to gush blood and finally appears to be bursting. "Oh no…Slater! Run! The queen is filled with acid and ready to explode!" At the end of the sentence, the queen explodes and green goo fills the room. All of the nearby maggots are killed. The druid just barely manages to grab a low hanging root and avoids the acid. "Slater? Where are you?" The druid turns around and sees Slater standing on the shaft of the staff. She had jammed it into the wall and pulled herself up. "Nice job Slater. One second, I'll get us out." The druid appears to be concentrating pretty hard. Within a few seconds, the two of them are at the entrance to the lair. "Well, Druid, that's certainly a useful skill." The druid laughs slightly. "Thanks Slater." The druid stares off for a second before talking. "Well, to continue our journey, we must go through Lile's old home village." Slater looks at the Druid strangely. "Old village? Do you think that's where she is?" The druid stares at the ground. "No…that village has been destroyed for a long time. Years ago, the village was attacked by a wolf, not just any wolf though, he was bigger than most humans and smarter than near all of them. He burnt the village to the ground and killed everyone within it. Everyone but Lile… She fought the wolf for hours, neither of them were making much progress against the other. However, a woman who had somehow survived the wolf's attack was crawling on the ground and gave out a loud scream. This was all the wolf needed, Lile turned around towards the scream and a couple seconds later was knocked onto the ground by the wolf. It went downhill from there for Lile, she was on the ground, nearly unconscious less than a minute after that. Then, the wolf turned her head to look at the crawling woman, then slowly walked over to the woman and ripped her apart slowly, being careful not to let her die until the end. Lile began to cry before going unconscious entirely. We're not sure why, but the wolf decided to leave Lile there, and scouts from the monastery who had heard of the attack on the village found her close to dead two days later. They brought her to the monastery and that's where we met. Well, I guess I got caught up in my story, I'm sorry. Let's continue. There's a temple further ahead, the Claw Viper Temple. In there is the head of that staff we got back in the lair." Slater looks depressed from hearing the story. "Ok Druid, let's go." The two of them continue on through the destroyed buildings and past many charred skeletons. They go through a small passage between two mountains and find the entrance to the temple. They go down the stairs and find snake-men turned the other way. The druid laughs slightly. "Easy kills." The druid kills the two snake-men and moves on with Slater. There aren't any more monsters in the temple. The two of them reach some more stairs leading down and start to descend them. "Why were there only the two snake-men?" The druid seems to not want to answer the question. "Uh-I'm not sure." The two of them reach the bottom of the stairs. In the center of this new room is an altar that gives off a white aura. The druid runs over and smashes it into the ground. A small amulet looking object that had been on the altar slides across the floor. "Druid, what was that about?" The druid glances at Slater. "It was tainted, it's not important. What is important is that we rest here for the night. From here we will need to go to Tal Rasha's tomb and find out way to Baal's Chamber, it won't be easy." Slater agrees, and the two lie down on the floor. Later that night, Slater wakes to the sound of Baal's voice. "SLATER! THE DRUID IS NOT ON YOUR SIDE." Slater jumps up. "Why the heck should I believe _you_?" "WHY SHOULDN'T YOU? THAT DRUID HAS CUASED YOU NOTHING BUT PAIN SINCE YOU MET! YOU'VE DIED MORE THAN ONCE SINCE YOU WERE SEPERATED FROM LILE." Slater glances at the druid. "Forget it Baal! I may have been in danger because of him more than on one occasion since only yesterday, but he got me out of it every time!" Baal laughs loudly and the room is suddenly silent." Slater looks again at the druid and feels a sudden hatred come over her, she can't hold herself back. She sends waves of fireballs at him. Somehow sensing the attack in his sleep, he jumps out of the way just in time. "Slater! What are you doing?" "You're against me Druid! On the side of evil!" Slater continues sending balls of fire at the druid who also continues to dodge them. The druid inches towards Slater and jumps on top of her. "Get off me Druid!" The druid pulls the head of the staff from Slater's pocket and puts it in the path of a stray fireball and jams it onto the top of the shaft, it solidifies there, making the staff whole again. Slater is continuing to struggle to get free from the druid and sending fireballs everywhere, even though her arms are still being held on the ground towards a wall. The druid smirks. "Well Slater, it's been nice working with you, it's too bad you'll need to stay here and die from either hunger or thirst if the heat doesn't get to you first. Slater screams in rage at the druid. "GET OFF!" The druid laughs loudly, takes the staff and disappears in a fiery blaze. "I can't believe the druid would betray me like that!" Slater stays lying on the ground and looks at her wrists, they're a dark purple and she can barely move her hands. She attempts to stand but falls back to the ground; her legs had been burnt during the druid's exit. Slater's eyes begin to water from the pain. She pulls herself to her feet with the help of the wall and leans back against it for support. She looks around and sees that the altar the druid had destroyed had been covering a hole in the ground. She limps over to it and falls in. She lands on a steep slope and begins falling. After nearly two minutes of fast sliding, she flies out of the passage into a small room and lands on her back. She lies there and thinks of just giving up. She sighs and blacks out. "SLATER!" Slater wakes up, her entire body aching. "Huh? Who's there?" "Slater! It's me, Lile!" Slater doesn't want to get her hopes up, but turns towards the voice as quickly as she can manage without sitting up. "Lile…How'd you get here?" It _had_ been Lile talking, she was locked up in a cell. "Those fallen we were fighting, when they got news of us killing them off, they began releasing the fourth prime evil, the Outcast. They finished the required ritual just as we finished them off and the Outcast carried me off here." "The…Outcast? A prime evil? Wait, if he's a prime evil, how did something as weak as a group of fallen manage to capture him?" Lile looks away from Slater. "Um, I'm not sure, but that's not important. What _is _important is that he's been released. I don't know much about him other than he masquerades as a student of mine, a druid from a monastery I was raised in when I was young." "A…druid? No…" Lile looks concerned. "What's the matter Slater?" Slater looks up at Lile. "Oh, er, nothing." Lile raises an eyebrow at her and continues talking. "Well, we're in the lower levels of the Lut Gohlein palace. We can't go upstairs, if the guards find that we're in the castle without permission, they'll try to kill us. We should avoid that. So, we should try to find another way out. Our best chance, I'd guess is to go down." "Ok Lile, let's go." Lile examines Slater for a moment. "Um…maybe we should wait a little bit, you look hurt. Can you even stand?" Slater had forgotten she was still lying on the ground. She makes an attempt to pull herself up from the floor, but can barely bend her back. "I, uh, can't get up." Lile looks sadly at Slater and walks over to her. "Alright Slater, one second." Lile bends over Slater and a white light comes from her hands. Slater slowly feels the pain leaving her body and can soon move again. "Ok Slater, just don't strain yourself and you'll heal just fine, you'll just have a few bruises." Slater looks at her wrists, which are still purple and that at Lile. "Alright Lile, I'm ready to go." Slater stand up and the two sorceresses start heading deeper into the palace. After a couple of floors, they come upon a red portal. "Should we go through Lile?" Lile stares at the portal for a moment. "Well, it looks like it may be a way out, I'll go in first to see if it's safe, wait a minute or two before following." Lile is through the portal before Slater can give her opinion on the plan. Roughly two minutes later, without a sign of Lile, Slater enters the portal. Lile is sitting on some steps to the side of her. "Yup, nothing dangerous near the portal, and we're definitely out of the castle." Slater walks over to the side of the small path and looks off of it. She gets a dizzy feeling. "Yeah, and a lack of floor." Outside of the path is what seems like a bottomless hole. The two move along the path with nothing putting up much of a challenge for Lile. The path seems to go on forever but they eventually reach the end. There's a long set of stairs leading upwards. They reach the top of them and find one thing in the entire room. There's a tome on a pedestal. Lile walks over to the tome and begins to read it. A red portal opens to the left. "Slater, according to this tome, this portal will take us to Tal Rasha's tomb, it's far from Lut Gohlein, pretty far into the desert. However, it seems to be the only way to go." Slater thinks back for a second. "Tal Rasha's tomb…? Hey! I was on my way there before I ended up in your chamber." Lile looks strangely at Slater. "Alone? Why?" Slater looks at the ground, attempting to make something up quickly but isn't able to. "Um, I heard that Baal had been released and I was on my way to stop him." Lile gives Slater another weird look. "How do you know about Baal? And how do you expect to get into his chamber without the Horadric staff?" Slater gives a confused look, but then remembers the staff the Outcast had taken from her. "Oh, um, that. That's already been taken care of. That's, um, that's how Baal was released, a demon assembled it and used it to get to Baal." Lile sighs. "Well then, if that's true, it's up to us to stop Baal before he can get too far." Lile walks into the portal and Slater hesitantly follows her. The two find themselves in a room with one wall blown up. In the center is an orifice with the Horadric staff inside of it. "I guess you were right Slater. Come on, Baal's chamber should be right through this hole in the wall. The sorceresses begin to descend the stairs that the wall had been hiding. Lile glances over at Slater. "At the bottom of these steps is a creature called Duriel. He's here to protect Baal's seal and doesn't discriminate against good and evil. Anyone who wishes to reach Baal's chamber will need to deal with him first." Slater makes a nervous face and hesitantly continues down the stairs. A minute or two later, they reach the bottom of the steps. "What happened here?" Lile gives a look of shock and slowly looks around the room. Blood is splattered along the wall, there's even more dripping from the ceiling. "Lile, did Duriel do this?" Lile stays silent for a moment before answering. "No…" She points to a corner of the room at a pile of bones and ripped flesh. "That is." Slater stares at the pile for a moment in shock. "Then- then what happened?" "I'm not sure. However, I think if we continue we may find out." Slater thinks for a moment. "Well, I suppose that'd be best." The two move on into Baal's chamber. Unfortunately, Baal isn't there. Instead, an angel stands in his place. Lile walks up to him, looks at him harshly and yells "Where is Baal, angel?" The angel looks down at Lile. "Baal, he was freed from his seal not much longer than a day ago, I did what I could but before I could seal him back up, the Outcast appeared and distracted me. He chained me here after Baal escaped and finally, he left as well." Lile looks terrified. "Baal is free! This is horrible! If the Evils reunite… I don't even want to think of what might happen!" Lile prevents herself from attacking the angel. "Slater, we must go now, to Kurast, and prevent the Prime Evils from reuniting. We can take a boat from Lut Gohlein. The angel looks up at Lile. "I can create a portal for you to Lut Gohlein, I'm sorry for failure, but this can hopefully help to make up for my failure." Lile sighs. "Very well angel. Thank you." The angel creates a portal and the two sorceresses enter it, leaving the angel chained in Baal's chamber. "Ok Slater, we'll stay here for the night, there's an inn near the dock we can stay at." Slater agrees and the two of them rent out a room for the night. The next morning, Slater awakes to find Lile is gone. Not only that but, all of Lile's things are gone as well. Slater walks over to Lile's bed and finds a note. It reads "Slater, I've gone on to Kurast without you. I can't allow you to fight with beings as strong as the evils. Please Slater, don't follow me." The note is signed by Lile. "Why Lile? I don't want to be separated again…" Although Slater doesn't want to disobey Lile, she goes to the only person left in Lut Gohlein who's still crazy enough to try to sail to Kurast. The trip was mainly trouble free. However, there was one area with blood-red water and objects floating around along the surface of the water. Slater thought she saw a staff floating by at this time, but she blinked and it was gone.


	3. Act III

Act III

Later, Slater steps off of the boat and is greeted by a woman in black. With obvious false enthusiasm the woman begins talking to Slater. "Why hello there! Welcome to Kurast! Isn't it a beautiful day? Why not try the pub! They have great ales!" "Umm, hello?" The woman grits her teeth and is having trouble keeping her false smile. "Yes, yes! Didn't I already go over that?" The woman seems to be growing more and more annoyed. "Um, I'm sorry, but are you being forced to do this or something?" The woman loses all of her kindness now. "Do you think so? Does it seem like I enjoy being here? I get paid next to nothing and only per person who arrives here! How many people do you think come here a year?" Slater thinks for a moment. "100?" The woman laughs in a very annoying way. "THREE! Yet, every day I need to stand here for free!" Slater raises an eyebrow at the woman. "Well, why don't you get a different job?" The woman again seems to get more annoyed. "Don't you think I would if I could?" "Well, why can't you?" "That's none of your business! What's with all the questions?" Slater sighs. "I'm sorry. However, I do have one more. I'm searching for the Evils, do you know where I can find them?" The woman laughs once again. "Well, I guess I won't be seeing you again! One of the Prime Evils, Mephisto lives through the jungle. If you even make it that far, you must reach the bottom of his temple and after all of that, fight Mephisto himself." Slater looks strangely at the woman. "Why won't you be seeing me again?" The woman laughs once more. "You won't have a chance of surviving that journey!" Slater sighs again. "Well then perhaps you should come with me? I'm sure you're _so_ much stronger than I am." The woman seems to think hard for a moment. "Well, of course I am, but why would I go on a suicide mission?" Slater angrily begins to walk towards the town exit. "Fine, bye." The woman seems to argue with herself for a moment. "Wait! I'll go with you." Slater turns around to look at the woman. "I'm a trained assassin, maybe with the two of us we'll have a chance against Mephisto." Slater stares at the assassin for a moment. "Whatever, let's go." Slater and the assassin begin walking through the jungle. "So, what's your name anyway sorceress?" "I'm Slater, what's yours?" The assassin sighs. "I'm an assassin, if I went around giving out my name to whoever asked for it I'd be dead very quickly." Slater thinks for a moment. "Right, sorry." "So, Slater, be careful. There's a race of pygmies in this jungle. They sneak around with poisoned spears and darts." "Ok, thanks for the information. You be careful too." The assassin laughs. "Like _I _need to worry about pygmies." Slater sighs. The assassin starts running as fast she can, ahead of Slater. "Come on slow poke! Let's go!" The assassin takes a turn behind some trees while following the path. Immediately after, Slater hears a scream and runs towards where the assassin had turned. Slater finds that the assassin had just run into huge spider web in front of a cave entrance. Slater smirks. "I thought you weren't afraid of _anything_ assassin?" "I-I'm not!" The assassin makes a sad attempt to look brave without shaking. "You're afraid of spiders." "That's absurd! Only a creature like them…" The assassin realizes that Slater had already entered the cave. The assassin sighs and hesitantly enters the cave to find Slater. Slater laughs again. "Took you long enough assassin, scared?" "Uh, No! Whatever, why did you come down here anyway?" "Well, the captain of the ship that I came in here told me of a flail that I need to recreate if I want to reach Mephisto. To successfully create the flail, I'll need some remains of a man named Khalim. I'll need his brain, his heart, one of his eyes and what remains of his original flail. The eye is in a cave filled with spiders, which I think is where we are. The heart is in a chamber used by pygmies for torture. The brain is in the sewers of the Kurast Bazaar. Finally, the flail, I find confusing. The High Council, the ones who murdered Khalim have it." The assassin thinks to herself for a moment. "I know what he's talking about it, I'll deal with it after we get the body parts." Slater looks strangely at the assassin for a moment. "Ok?" The two go through the cave, slicing and squishing spiders. The assassin tries to stand back as much as possible. Eventually the two come upon a small, glowing chest. Slater opens it. "AHA! It's the eyeball, I was right." Slater smiles happily. As Slater's taking the eye from the chest, she finds that the assassin had already run from the cave. "Hurry up, slow poke!" Slater sighs and walks out from the cave. They continue traveling through the jungle. They don't get far before it starts to get dark. The two of them find a campfire. They don't see anyone nearby and decide to camp at it. A few moments later, they look up and see a dead woman hanging from a tree directly above them. The assassin gets a nervous look. "This must be a pygmy camp Slater." Slater looks around for a moment and stares into the jungle. "Could this be the pygmy village with that torture chamber?" Slater waits a moment and doesn't get an answer. She turns around and sees the assassin lying on the ground with a dagger through her chest. "Assassin!" Slater jumps up as a poisoned dart passes by where her head had been. Slater frantically tries to find where the pygmies are but can't find them. She begins shooting fireballs randomly in circles around her. All nearby trees begin to burn and the fire spreads. "Slater! You're going to burn the jungle down!" "Assassin, you're alive!" "Yeah, whatever." The assassin quickly lays traps on the ground and pulls Slater into a nearby building. Once they're safely inside and see burning pygmies running around in circles, the assassin pulls the dagger from her chest and stares at it. Slater looks at the assassin. "How're you alive? It doesn't even look like the dagger hurt you at all!" The assassin laughs slightly. "I should be asking you the same question." "What?" "Check your back." Slater finds two poisoned daggers through her back, four darts in her legs and one last dart in the back of her head. "Um, Assassin, the reason I'm here…trying to kill Mephisto, is because I'm the Chosen One. I must defeat all eight of the evils." The assassin gets a frightened look in her eyes. "The…Chosen One?" Yes, I've only defeated one of the evils, Andariel. Until all eight are killed, I'm unable to die. Maybe I give off an aura, allowing my allies the same ability?" The assassin laughs very slightly. "Yeah, maybe that's it." "What's with the sarcasm?" "Hm? Oh, Nothing, let's find that guy's heart. This should be that torture chamber you were talking about." "Right, let's go then." They turn around and find a chest containing the heart directly in front of them with a dead fallen on the side of it. "That was a bit easy…" The assassin examines the chest for a moment. "It looks like this fallen was attempting to get the heart out of the camp before you could get it. I think you got it with one of those fireballs earlier." Slater laughs a little. "Oops." Slater takes the heart and the two of them walk over the charred bodies of the fallen towards the Kurast Bazaar. It's not a long trip. It's immediately obvious that monsters have taken over the bazaar. Most buildings are either completely destroyed or already collapsed entirely. The two enter the town quietly, avoiding monsters. They find the sewers easily; it could be smelled almost from the entrance to the bazaar. They enter the sewers without being noticed and look around. Every so often there's a small group of monsters, but nothing that could take on Slater and the assassin. "I guess the smell is too bad even for the monsters, it's nearly empty down here." The assassin quirks an eyebrow at Slater. "Right." The two continue on and eventually find a lever. When they pull it, a nearby trap door opens. They go through and find a chest. Slater opens it and finds Khalim's brain. "Ok, well I have the three body parts already, where's the flail assassin?" The assassin looks at Slater. "The council dwells in Travincal, which is just up some stairs in the eastern part of the bazaar. Defeating the council won't be easy. However, if we do win, Mephisto will be waiting for us." "Yes, but we'll defeat him." The assassin laughs. "Right." Slater turns towards the trap door. "So, what're we waiting for? Let's go." Slater and the assassin leave the sewers. They go up the stairs to Travincal and find the council's building. As they open the door, they're both tackled to the ground. The assassin is on the ground with a dead council member on top of her. "Ha, I was expecting that." The assassin pushes the council member off of her and Slater and the two of them get up. "Come on council! I dare ya! Come out and fight!" A three-headed dragon rises from the ground behind Slater and the assassin and begins shooting fireballs at them. "Quick Slater! In the building!" They run into the building and slam the door behind them. They turn from the door to find that the five remaining council members had surrounded them. They lunge towards the two of them. The assassin uses her blades to deflect the attacks. "Slater, two of them aren't as strong as the other three, see the ones with the amulets?" Slater looks towards the council members and notices two are wearing amulets. Also, of those two, one is holding Khalim's flail. "Yes." "Ignore them for now, of the three without amulets, kill the one on the left. I'll get the one on the right." The assassin counts to three and the two of them quickly take out the two council members. Immediately after, Slater gets back behind the assassin. "Ok Slater, we can't take on the three of them. You see the one with golden amulet? I want you to throw Khalim's body parts at him." Slater gives a surprised look at the assassin. "What?" "Just do it!" Slater hesitates for moment before taking out the body parts. She then stares at them for a second and finally throws them at the council member. The three body parts begin to glow and seem to fuse with the flail. "Assassin, all that did was make him mad. Not to mention make his weapon more powerful." The assassin smirks. "Good." Slater stops trying to understand the assassin's plan. "What now?" "When I count to three, run to the front of that glowing orb with me. When the council member with the flail is about to hit you, run to the side." Slater seems confused but agrees. "1…2…3!" The two dodge past the council members and run in front of the glowing orb. The council members chase them immediately. They stop directly in front of the Slater and the assassin. The head council member raises Khalim's flail and brings it down quickly. Slater and the assassin jump to the side immediately. The glowing orb is smashed entirely by the flail. "That went exactly as planned. Good job Slater." Slater looks at the assassin. "What exactly was the point of that?" The room begins to shake and the entire building starts to collapse. "What's going on assassin?" The three remaining council members fall to the ground and burst into flame. "Just like I said Slater, exactly as planned." The floor crumbles beneath them and they fall into a large room. Slater goes unconscious when she hits the ground. When she awakes, she sees the assassin sitting against a wall. "Finally awake Slater?" Slater shakes her head a little to help herself wake up. "Uh, I guess so. Where are we?" "This is the Durance of Hate, Mephisto's lair. To tell you the truth, I'm very surprised you've made it this far. Of course, you wouldn't have if I wasn't here, but still. It's surprising." Slater sighs. "The hard part wasn't getting here. It's going to be not being slain by Mephisto. I may revive after being killed, but, what if my head is ripped off or something? I would continuously revive and bleed to death. It'd be a never-ending cycle, never-ending pain." "Pain…" "Huh?" "Er, nothing, but you shouldn't think that way. Your quest must be completed. You can't give up now." "I guess your-" Slater gets a sharp pain in her head. "SLATER." "You again? What do you want!" "SLATER, YOUR CHOICE OF ALLIES IS TRULY TERRIBLE. THE ONLY TRUE ALLY YOU'VE EVER HAD IS NOW IN HELL. HER SHIP WAS SUNK BY MY MINIONS, ONE IN PARTICULAR." "SHUT UP! SHE IS ON MY SIDE, LILE IS ALIVE, AND YOU WILL SOON BE DEAD!" The whole area is suddenly silent. "Slater? What was that about?" Slater sits on the ground. She holds her legs to her face and begins to cry. "Assassin." "What's wrong?" "Leave." The assassin looks confused and isn't sure what to do. "Why?" "I SAID LEAVE!" The assassin begins walking away slowly and then turns around. "But Slater, you need my help to defeat Mephisto!" Slater looks up at the assassin and stares at her for a minute. "Assassin, I don't know what to do anymore, but you're right. I need your help." "Ok, well, shall we go? The Lord of Hatred awaits." Slater stands up and wipes her eyes. "Ok assassin, I just hope I'm right in trusting you." The two of them walk into the next room, go down a flight of stairs and reach Mephisto's chamber. "Are you ready to defeat pain itself Slater?" Slater shrugs. "I hope so." They make their way to the other side of the long chamber to find Mephisto. "Your quest ends here-" Mephisto looks down to find the assassin's claws through his chest. The assassin smirks. "Yes it does, it's complete." Mephisto gushes blood as the assassin pulls her claws from his chest. He stands still for a moment before falling to the ground, dead. "Assassin? You kept telling me this wouldn't be easy. You just killed him in one shot! Plus, my quest isn't complete. I've only defeated two of the eight evils." "I said that _my_ quest was complete, not yours. However, your quest will still be ending shortly. You will be defeated by a lesser evil. The Mistress of Pain." "What? Where is she?" The assassin laughs. "You can't tell? She is I. Are you ready to die?" The assassin gets into a battle stance, in preparation to charge at Slater. "Assassin, what are you talking about? If you're a lesser evil, why would you travel with me? Not to mention slay your own brother?" The Mistress of Pain smiles evilly. "I used you Slater, for revenge. Revenge for us both." "Revenge? Revenge for what?" The Mistress gives a strange look at Slater. "The siege of Hell, Slater. Do you remember nothing? Slater, you are-" The lava to the side of them begins to bubble and the room shakes violently. "MISTRESS OF PAIN, YOU'VE BETRAYED THE LORDS OF HELL ONE TOO MANY TIMES!" "NO! Baal, please don't!" The Mistress' body begins to shrivel and deteriorate. "THE LESSER EVILS WILL FALL!" "Slater, avenge me…" The mistress falls to the ground, only half a skeleton. Soon after, she melts entirely into the ground. "Assassin? What just happened? Baal? Did you kill her? Assassin, you said I was something. What am I? Who am I? I'm not sure anymore." Slater falls to the ground, not sure what to do next. "SLATER." "Baal, leave me alone, I have no time for you." Baal laughs menacingly. "I DON'T CARE. YOU'RE NEXT." "What?" Slater jumps up and is suddenly unable to breathe. She looks down at her hands, they're beginning to shrivel. The skin on her body begins to fall onto the ground in clumps. "B-Baal…" Slater falls to the ground in a bloody pile of her own body parts.


	4. Act IV

Act IV

"Slater? What are you doing here?" Slater opens her eyes. "Lile? I'm alive?" Lile looks away from Slater slightly. "Um, I'm afraid not Slater. We're in the middle of Hell." "We're, dead?" "Well, yes, but two good things came out of it at least." "Like what?" "Diablo, the Lord of Terror. As well as the angel, if we defeat Diablo, he's promised that he'll be able to return us to the surface." "But, how did I die?" The angel walks up to Slater. "That was Baal's doing, he destroyed your body. You would have lost your soul entirely if I hadn't done something. I built a body as best I could for you, and used the last of my power to pull your soul into it." Slater looks at herself. "Wow, I look almost exactly the same." Baal ripped your body from the surface and sucked it down here. I used what I was able to find. What I couldn't find I replaced with my own flesh." Slater notices that half of the angel's left wing is missing. "Thank you…very much angel. I'm sorry to be rude, but I must be going. I can't stay here long while the evils rampage on the surface." "I understand." Slater runs from the building to begin the search for Diablo. "Come on, Lile! Let's go!" Lile walks at a slow pace behind her. "Don't rush Slater." They travel for only about ten minutes before Lile speaks. "Slater, we'll reach the River Styx soon." Slater turns and stares blankly at Lile. "Which means, what?" "That's where spirits are guided from the surface into Hell. The Lord of Terror himself, is at the end of it." "Well, let's go then!" Lile sighs. "I told you to stop rushing." Slater had already run ahead. Lile catches up a few moments later. "Lile, you seem hesitant to kill Diablo, what's wrong?" "Nothing, let's just go." Lile walks ahead. They continue on, through the River of Styx and reach Diablo's home, the Chaos Sanctuary. "Is this the place Lile?" Lile pauses for a moment. "Yes, this is it Slater." "SLATER." "Baal, go away! You've already killed me, what now?" "YOUR ONE TRUE ALLY, IS DISAPPEARING. SLOWLY JOINING THE SIDE OF THE DARK ONES. SHE IS BEGIN TAINTED BY THE EVIL." "You lie! That's impossible!" "YOU WILL SOON MEET A FATE WORSE THAN DEATH SLATER. YOU WILL HAVE NO ALLIES, UNABLE TO HELP. MEANWHILE, THE EVILS WILL DESTROY THE PLANET." "SHUT UP!" "Slater? What's the matter?" Slater holds back tears. "Lile, we need to speed this up." Slater goes through the sanctuary and smashes the five seals keeping Diablo held back. "Not even death can save you from me!" Slater dies. "Come on, we're already dead!" Diablo doesn't look happy about being made fun of. "Slater, that's enough talking, let's do this." Lile casts a frozen orb at Diablo, knocking his arm off. "Lile, that seems a bit cruel." "Well Slater, since I got here, I've begun to enjoy things I didn't before. I enjoy…killing." Slater looks down at her feet. "You've begun to feel…evil? Baal was telling the truth. He always does." Slater watches on as Lile rips Diablo limb from limb. She doesn't plan to kill him any time soon. "Lile, please kill him quickly." Lile laughs evilly as bloods spurts from Diablo's body onto her face. "No Slater." Slater runs over and jabs her staff through Diablo's head. He dies immediately. "Lile, no one deserves to go through that much pain. Not even Diablo." "Don't ruin my fun Slater." Slater sighs and walks back to the fortress. Lile follows slowly behind. "Angel, Diablo is defeated, may we return to the surface now?" "Slater, you may pass. However, Lile, she must stay." "What? Why!" "She has been tainted by Diablo's evil. As all spirits sent her do. Now Slater, run into the portal. Lile will soon be tainted entirely." Slater looks back at Lile, who looks extremely annoyed. Lile practically explodes at the angel. Slater turns back to the portal and runs through. It closes behind her.


	5. Act V

Act V

"Well, I'm on the surface. The angel didn't mention where I'd come out." The earth begins to shake. "Lile." Slater walks on through the town she's in. She finds a druid who looks strangely familiar. "Outcast!" "The Druid pays no attention and walks on. "DON'T IGNORE ME DRUID!" The druid turns to look at Slater. "Do I know you?" "You led me into the desert and left me for dead!" "I don't understand what you're talking about. Who are you?" "YOU KNOW WHO I AM DRUID! I'M SLATER!" "The one Baal has been speaking of? Slater, the chosen one?" Slater sighs and clenches her fists. "Druid, you're…BUGGING ME!" Slater gets ready to punch the druid. However, the ground suddenly begins to shake violently. "Whoa! What's going on?" "Lile." "Lile, my master?" "Don't try that again druid! You're not really Lile's apprentice. You're the Outcast!" The druid looks at Slater. "No, you're wrong. I was her apprentice until she disappeared years ago. Why would you call me the Outcast?" Slater sighs, deciding to believe him for the time being. "The Outcast claimed to be Lile's apprentice. He looked exactly like you." "So, you meant the fourth prime evil?" "Yes. Wait, how do you know about that?" "What do you mean?" "Only me, Lile and the evils know what the chosen one is. Never mind _who_ it is. Plus, how do you know about the evils?" "SLATER, THE DRUID WILL BE THE CAUSE OF YOUR QUEST'S FAILURE." Slater gets ready to answer but the druid beats her to it. "Baal, I'm not Slater!" Slater stares blankly at the druid. "Y-you heard that?" "Of course, but he keeps talking to someone named Slater. So, since your name is Slater, appeared out of a portal in the middle of town and know whom the evils are. I'm assuming you're the Slater he means?" "Yes, as I said before, I'm the Chosen One." Well, if that's true, perhaps you can help me?" "With what?" "I'm going to defeat a warlord at the other side of the foothills." "I'm just trying to defeat the evils. Four still live." "What if I told you the final four are nearby?" "What! Where?" The druid smiles happily. "Help me defeat this warlord, and I'll bring you to them." Slater thinks for a moment. "Wait, how do you know where they are?" "Since Baal was released from his seal in Al Kharid, him and the others have been attacking the town constantly. Our boundaries have nearly fallen entirely." Slater finally believes the druid entirely. "Ok then, let's go." The druid and Slater leave the town and cut through the armies of Hell until they reach the warlord the druid had been speaking of, Shenk the Overseer. The druid makes quick work of him. Slater watches from behind. "He seems as strong as the Outcast, but- could he be fooling me a second time? No! The Outcast wasn't able to hear Baal speaking to me." The druid turns from Shenk's corpse to look at Slater. "Slater, what's wrong?" "Oh! Um, nothing druid. Let's go back to town." The druid stares at Slater for a moment. "Ok, sure." They go back to town and the druid wanders off to a shop. He runs up to Slater a few minutes later. "We need to go!" Slater gets a confused look. "Huh? Wh-?" The druid grabs Slater and drags her along as he runs to the sacred mountain and into a deep cave. "Druid! What are you doing? Where are we going?" "There's no time Slater! We must hurry! Anya, my love, she is trapped down here!" "You have a girlfriend druid?" "Yes, but if we take too long, she'll be a dead one!" Slater is silent until they find Anya, half frozen in a block of ice. "Anya!" "D-druid. Ask Malah. For help." "Slater! Get help!" The druid rips a portal open from nowhere. "Wow druid. That's amazing!" "SHUT UP AND GO!" Slater looks a bit offended but understands. She jumps into the portal and appears back in town. "Malah! The druid needs help!" Malah walks over and gives Slater a vial of potion. "I know. Give this to Anya." Slater thanks her and goes back into the portal. After arriving back in the cave, she gives the potion to Anya. The ice melts and she seems warmer. "Thank you!" "You scared me Anya!" "Nihlathak, the lesser evil, did this to me. I'll open a portal to his lair when we get back to town." The druid gives a sigh of relief but looks angered about the new information. "Ok Anya, let's go." Anya disappears through the portal. "So, dru-" The ground begins to shake rapidly and the frozen rivers begin to crack. Water doesn't leak from them however, magma does. "Lile! She's escaping Hell!" "Through the portal Slater! Hurry!" Slater jumps inside of the portal. The town is in panic. Magma is everywhere. "Lile, why won't you just stay in Hell?" It's been ten minutes since the druid had been left alone. Slater begins to get worried. She jumps into the portal once more. The cave has calmed down. However, rivers of lava are flowing throughout it. "Druid?" Slater walks around, searching for the druid. Soon after, she finds him lying on the ground. He seems to give off a slightly red aura. "Druid! Are you alright?" The druid sits up. "Lile, she appeared from beneath the magma." "What? Where'd she go!" The druid shrugs. "She ran at me and I blacked out. I was unconscious until you woke me a moment ago." Seeing she isn't going to learn anything else, she helps the druid up. The two of them take the portal back to town. "So druid, shall we kill the lesser evil Anya spoke of?" The druid shrugs. "Sounds like a plan to me." The two find Anya and take the portal she's opened. They arrive at a temple with skeletons carrying large swords. The druid is able to keep them away. They make their way to the bottom floor quickly. There, they find Nihlathak. "The third lesser evil? A necromancer?" "Yes, I hope you can run fast, Slater." They run at Nihlathak. "Your hopeless quest ends here, sorceress!" Nihlathak summons continuous skeletons. If they're killed, their bodies explode. "A never ending defense?" The druid looks at Slater. "Remember how I asked if you were a fast runner?" "Um, yeah?" "See ya!" The druid disappears. "Betrayal? Again?" The skeletons close in and Slater runs for her life. However, less than a minute later, the druid shows up and kills them. "Nihlathak can't make them explode from here, and as long as the corpses remain, he's unable to resummon them." "I thought that you betrayed me druid." "I wouldn't do that Slater, don't worry." They return to Nihlathak and have no trouble killing him without his minions. "Only one lesser evil remains, and two prime. My quest is nearing its end." "Congratulations Slater. Are you ready for Baal?" "Yes." "SLATER, THE OUTCAST WILL BE YOUR DOOM, LILE NOW CONTROLS HIM. THERE IS NO HOPE FOR YOU!" "What?" Did you say something Slater?" "You didn't hear that druid?" "Huh?" "N-nothing." "POSSESSION, WITH LILE FINALLY IN TOUCH WITH HER EVIL SIDE, SHE'LL BE ABLE TO LEARN MANY ABILITES LIKE THAT." "SHUT UP BAAL!" The area is quiet and the druid stares at Slater. "Slater, what's wrong?" "Nothing druid, I'm fine." Slater gets a sharp pain in her head. "NO YOUR NOT SLATER, YOU'LL FACE YOUR DOOM IMMEDIATELY AFTER I'M KILLED." Slater holds her head and winces with pain. "BAAL…JUST…SHUT…UP!" "Slater, I don't hear Baal, what are you talking about?" "Nothing druid! Let's just go!" The druid looks at Slater for a moment and then agrees. The two of them return to the top of the building and leave through the portal. They then climb the sacred mountain and meet the guardians. "They're frozen in stone?" The druid walks to the pedestal and reads the tome upon it. The three guardians come to life and attack. "Druid, I learned a new spell from a book I found back in Nihlathak's chamber. May I try it out?" "Sure?" Slater casts a frozen orb at the three guardians. They die, disappear and reappear back upon the pedestals as golden statues. "You are worthy…" "Wow Slater, very nice spell." "Thanks." The two of them get to the bottom floor where they meet Baal. "This is almost the end druid, after this, only a single prime and lesser evil will remain." The druid smirks. "It's time for my final revenge against my brothers and sisters. They sold me to the fallen. They made me…Outcast." "Druid?" "Slater, wait a moment, you will be next." "Huh?" The druid walks up to Baal, dodging his attacks with ease. "And here brother, your life ends." The druid slits Baal's throat and he drops to the ground, dead. "Druid? What's going on? You're confusing me." "Slater, it's time to face your doom!"


	6. Adept Quest:Epilogue

Epilogue

"What do you mean?" "A lesser evil remains." "I know?" The Outcast laughs evilly. "You, sorceress, you are the only being stopping the last prime evil from his death? The only way to save the world of Sanctuary…is with your death! _You_ Slater are the final lesser evil!" "NO! I don't believe that at all! I _refuse_ to believe it!" "Slater, I've used you to help me get my revenge. Why do you think Baal never lied? It was never him. He couldn't talk through telekinesis in a million years. It was I. I was going to kill my brothers and sisters alone to prove my worth to them. However, you're persistence to live had me leave you until last. Besides, do you really think the chosen one would have such a simple journey? Did you ever once have trouble defeating the other evils? You're not the chosen one Slater. You've kill Andariel, the Mistress of Pain, Nihlathak, Mephisto, Diablo and Baal. I'm the Outcast as you've probably figured out. What of the final evil? The fourth lesser evil?" Slater tries to hold back her anger. "You lie, Outcast! I don't believe any of that!" The Outcast laughs menacingly. "Now, the evils will be reborn, all of your work, your life in general, was a waste." "What! What are you going to do, kill me? Besides, why would you revive your brothers and sisters? They sold you to a clan of demons!" Slater gets into a battle stance. "Why wouldn't I? They're my brothers and sisters, do they not deserve another chance? If they betray me again, I'll destroy them." The Outcast transforms into his wolf form and begins to walk closer to the sorceress. "No! Please, don't!" Slater begins to back away, knowing this is a losing fight. "And now, Sorceress, the final lesser evil will fall!" Slater stops on the edge of the platform she had been on, nearly falling off. The Outcast lifts his claw up high and prepares to kill her, but suddenly jerks back. The Outcast screams in pain and holds his head. "What? What is this!" "No one touches my apprentice…" "GAH! Get out of my head!" Slater stares at the Outcast, astonished. "Lile?" The master of Slater, Lile, leaves the Outcasts body. "Except me." "Lile! What are you saying!" Lile laughs menacingly. "You left me for dead in Hell Slater, I will return the favor myself. Do not fear your death." The sorceress sends a stream of fire at Slater. "W-why Lile?" "It must be done if I'm to have chaos and destruction at all times. Outcast, I command you, revive the other evils!" Slater lies on the ground, bleeding to death. She watches the Outcast undoing all that she had accomplished. There, she dies, her mission unaccomplished.


	7. War of Infection:Prologue

In the Necromancer valley of Zakarum, the necromancer of the name Slater had been in a deep meditation. In this meditation, he had learned much of what had happened. He saw the battles of the "Chosen One". He saw what had happened with Lile in the recesses of Hell. After his deep meditations, he decided that he had to go to the necromancer's Black Citadel and tell the wise ones of his visions. The wise ones were fascinated of this story and told him to call the villagers to a town meeting, because the people needed to hear about what had happened. At the meeting, Slater walked through a crowd of villagers and went to step on a platform. As he did, it rose to a higher point from which he could speak. "People of Zakarum!" He shouted. "As you may already know I had recently been in deep meditation. In this time, I had a vision of the recent past. The vision was definitely not a good one. The evils have been resurrected." The crowd goes silent as the sky turns blood red. Then an odd looking man in a worn cloak, which hid his face appeared in the distance. He walked toward the necromancer as the crowd cleared a path in fright. The cloaked man removed his hood to reveal his identity. It was the well-known prophet of the necromancers. He then looked up at Slater and told him something in a creepy spine chilling voice that could case mortal men to run in fear. "NECROMANCER…YOUR TIME HAS COME." He said. "What do you speak of?" said the necromancer. "YOUR GREATEST TIME IS NOW, YOU MUST TAKE THE PLACE OF THE CHOSEN ONE!" "What?" said the necromancer. "YOU ARE THE CHOSEN ONE. YOU MUST PREPARE TO FACE YOUR GREATEST FEARS. YOU MUST DESTROY THE EVILS. YOU MUST DESTROY…THE OUTCAST." The prophet then disappeared in a dark mist-like cloud. The skies turned back to their dark black state and the necromancer stood in astonishment. After many days of training, he leaves Zakarum to complete his destiny.

- - -

In the Evil's outpost near the very center of the Lut Gohlein desert, the Evils are discussing their new "problem". There at a round table is Baal, Diablo, Andariel, The Outcast, Nihlathak, Mephisto and the Mistress of Pain. They sit there, having a serious conversation. "The prophet has chosen his hero." Diablo bursts out. "That is unacceptable." Baal says with a smirk. Nihlathak then rolls his eyes and sighs. He says something, "As you all may know, the appointed hero is a necromancer. I also am a necromancer, of _much_ greater power. He may be strong, but my necromancer skills are much more powerful than that novice's." Then, Andariel shouts, "You are quite cocky Nihlathak, but you are so naïve. Heroes always gain power quickly." Then Mephisto shouts, "You are all wrong, my minions and I shall crush the puny necromancer!" "Let me destroy him!" yells Baal. The evils all fight as Lile stands in the corner of the room. Andariel then suddenly stands up and smacks Nihlathak with one of her massive claws as he counter attacks with a bone spear. Meanwhile, Mephisto summons hydras and some of his minions. Diablo wipes them out with his lightning attack. The table burns and they all begin to fight, except the Outcast and Lile. The two of them continue their conversation. "Hm, this hero might be powerful in the end." Says the Outcast. "Yes, but the immolation of the previous "Chosen One" shall _not_ be in vain. If I have to, I will kill him myself." After a while, each of the Evils had killed each other in grotesque ways. They were each mangled and torn apart. Gore was spread across the room. The Outcast and Lile decide to resurrect them once more. Afterwards, they'd send each of them to places that they expected Slater to travel. It would be like a game. "The chosen one has a difficult journey ahead of him." "That is correct Lile…most correct."

- - -

Lile is standing in the corner, leaning against the wall, thinking to herself. "What is causing this evil in me? Am I truly evil of my own free will? Or is it something else? Something…living within me?" She begins to use her finger to trace the long scar the Outcast had left on her forehead so long ago. "Why would I join the forces of the same being who did this to me?" The scar begins to burn and to bleed. "What is this? Outcast, come here, quickly!" The Outcast walks into the room. "What's the problem Lile?" "My forehead is bleeding heavily, you can't see the problem yourself?" "So, you have a cut on your face." Lile stares blankly at the Outcast while trying to hold back the blood. The Outcast yawns. "Lile, you're already dead, what's the problem?" Since when do the undead have this much blood in their bodies?" "That scar there, it will bleed if you question my authority. If you ever even have a thought of betraying me while you remain tainted." "What? How did you do that?" "The evils, we've discovered a new ability of ours. We have the ability to infect the souls of mortals and use them as we wish. The prophecy tells that the evils will use this ability and make the world a living Hell. In the end only you and me will remain. We will be the king and the queen of Hell. That is the war of infection. Nothing can stop it from happening…except the chosen one." By now, Lile is beginning to stop bleeding. She's very pale and is standing in a large puddle of her blood. "That's interesting. Sounds like good fun too." "That's more like the Lile I know, have I told you how to infect the mortals yet?" "No? I'm not an evil, how would I infect them?" The Outcast laughs. "You are as close to an evil as any mortal can come. In fact, you've become almost pure evil. That's the only reason my infection won't allow me to control your mind. That's not important though. The process is simple. Just give a quick slash to the arm of the mortal you want to infect with the demon claws you've grown. That will begin the infestation process. They will immediately fall unconscious and after two or three days, they will awake as a loyal servant to you. Unless you're killed or they are, they will remain that way eternally." Lile looks down at her hands and notices the long black claws that have begun to grow from where her fingernails had been. "I hadn't even noticed these growing. Perhaps I'll miss having fingernails Outcast? Then what?" The Outcast shakes his head. "Oh come on Lile, is that really important? You're a demon now, not a human." "Well, I suppose that's true, but, either way, I was once human and there will be things I miss of it." "Um, Lile, sorry to change the subject on you, but we have visitors." Arrows shoot through the windows of the building. "Lile, ready to test the powers of infestation?" "Of course." Within five minutes, two armies of two hundred men each that had been fighting each other stopped warring. All lay on the ground with a long gash in one of their arms. The Outcast laughs. "The War of Infection begins."

- - -

"Outcast, if we can control a mortal by clawing their arm, what is topping us from simply controlling the Chosen One himself?" "Lile, what would be the point? If it were even possible in the first place." "What do you mean?" "Well, we could easily defeat the chosen one with our physical and magical attacks. Plus, the chosen one is immune to the infection. Just as pure evil is immune, so is pure good." "Outcast, that's a bad attitude to have, it may get you killed some day." The Outcast laughs. "That's a good one Lile. I'm practically invincible. The only worthy opponent in the entire world I would ever have is you." Lile makes a face at the Outcast and walks out from the room. "He's such a child sometimes. Any time I attempt to be helpful, he laughs at me and says there's no point. He has too much faith in his own abilities. All of his brothers and sisters have fallen more than once, and if I hadn't killed Slater, he probably would have as well." Lile sighs and continues walking. The next thing she knows, she's face first on the ground. Her staff flies out of her hand as she falls. "Don't move Lile! You're trapped." Lile knows that she could escape easily but humors the men. "And who are you?" "Wouldn't _you_ like to know!" Lile sighs. "I'll give you to the count of three." As she says this, the men toss her into a cage. She laughs. "One." "That cage has a special enchantment on it. Made by the fallen." "Two." "Lile! You're powerless and you know it!" "Three!" Lile jumps forward to break from the cage but as she hits the edge feels her power drain. She slumps to the bottom of the cage, unable to move. The men tie a rope to the cage and begin to drag it along. One of the men begins to talk to another. "Won't the Outcast be here soon? We have no way of taking down an evil without surprise." The second man chuckles slightly. "He has way too much confidence in Lile. He's probably still asleep in the outpost." Lile starts to laugh a little. "Perhaps his confidence is well placed." Suddenly, a large amount of arrows fire over some dunes to the men's right. "What is this?" Lile laughs. "As the Outcast would say…"You've got visitors"!" Lile smirks as her infected army marches towards the remaining men. "Are you ready to die? No one attacks Lile and lives." The men don't last more than three seconds as each member of the infected army slices at them at once. Lile laughs for a moment before falling unconscious. She awakes, out of the cage in the sand. Her army is gone. Soon after she remembers her staff is back at the outpost. She has no idea where the men had brought her. "Where am I?" She kills a nearby monster with a quick punch to its face and steals it's dagger. "The Outcast better get here soon, or I'll kill him!" The scar on her face begins to bleed. "I'll kill him…"

- - -

After the necromancer trains for his long journey, he begins to travel east. He decides the best place to being would be where the first "chosen one" did. The quickest way there from Zakarum involved taking a ship over the Sea of the Shinsho. He recruits whom he can and buys a ship. He leaves immediately. As the giant wooden ship crosses the vast ocean, something unexpected happens. One of the crewmates looks with his spyglass out to the sea. The necromancer is leaning on the side of the boat while the sailor says something about a flock of sea gulls. As soon as the necromancer hears this he gets up and rips the spyglass out of his hands. "Oh my…" he says, surprised. "The Shinsho." The sailor replies in a drunken, disturbing voice, "What the heck is the Shinsho?" "You wouldn't want to know." Said the necromancer. "It could destroy this ship in one- WOAH!" The ship is the caught up in a giant whirlpool. Out of the center rises a giant Draken. "Oh no." Slater says. "The legendary Shinsho." "Let us fight him. Luckily, we are transporting Elvin archers. Call them up!" Yelled the captain. The elves rush up from the cargo area with their bows and arrows and immediately rushed to battle. The arrows flowed to the Draken and simply agitated him. The Draken smashes the main mast clear off of the ship. The necromancer casts spells onto the Draken, when all of a sudden a wave wiped out all of the elves. "Men over board!" yelled a crewmate. The elves cry for help when the Draken sucks them into his mouth and devours them. Then the Draken smashes the front half of the ship. The necromancer turns around and gets knocked out by a tentacle. He blacks out. He awakes later that day on a beach near a large desert town. "Looks like I'm going to need a new boat…" Slater goes into town and his quest truly begins.


	8. Act VI

Slater walks into the city and looks around. It seems abandoned entirely. "Where is everyone?" He walks through the city and comes upon the palace. He finds a paper stuck to its side. It tells of a group of mercenaries lost in the desert after a search for Lile. There's a reward of ten thousand gold coins. Below this is what seems to be a letter from the prince to the people. Slater examines it closer and finds that it's signed by the prince of Lut Gohlein. "This is Lut Gohlein? I thought this place was supposed to be livelier? Even for a desert city, this place seems deserted." A woman's voice comes from behind Slater. "Are you lost or something?" Slater quickly turns around and sees the woman. She's heavily armored. She has her face covered with a mask, her head wrapped with a blood red cloth and is holding a small silvery dagger. If not for her voice, it'd be impossible to tell whether she was a man or a woman. "I asked you a question!" "Er-Uh, Oh! Yeah, kind of. I'm Slater and I-" "No one cares, you shouldn't be here!" Slater looks offended. "Excuse me? Do you know whom you're talking to? I'm the chosen one! I will go wherever I please!" "Is that so?" The woman grabs Slater by the collar of his shirt and levitates into the air, giving off a red aura. "And what makes you think that I'll let you do that?" Slater stares into the expressionless mask, unable to speak, sweating uncontrollably. "I-I-uh…" "You're worse than the "original", fool!" The woman lets go of Slater's shirt and throws him to the ground. Slater begins to stutter. "I-I'm sorry, I should've been more polite to you, stranger. What's your name?" "Repay me by bringing me with you." "Huh? That doesn't answer my question. Besides, what if I want to travel alone?" "I'm not _asking_ you, fool, I'm _telling_ you." Slater stares at the woman for a moment. "F-fine. But what's your name?" "Just call me, master. Let's go." The woman begins walking towards the town entrance and Slater hesitantly follows her. "Where are we going? You don't even know what my quest is yet!" "You assume more than you should, chosen one." "What's that supposed to mean?" The woman laughs at Slater. "What, your visions only show the past and don't help show the future?" Slater stares at the woman, wide-eyed. "H-how do you know about my visions?" "You have much to learn Slater. As you probably know, the evils have been revived and both Lile and the Outcast live. The weakest of the eight evils, Andariel, is in this desert." "Did _she_ destroy Lut Gohlein?" "No." "Then what did?" "That's not important. What _is_ important is that Andariel is defeated." "I don't understand you!" Slater looks a little annoyed. The woman chuckles slightly. By this time, the two have reached the Lost City, Lile's original home. "Andariel, come on out, I know you're here!" Andariel jumps out from within a crumbling building from behind the woman and knocks off her mask along with the red cloth. Slater stares at the woman, confused. "Oh my god! You're-!" Slater watches the blood drip down the woman's face, seeing that the cloth had turned red from blood. "Yes Slater, I'm Lile, but I'm on the side of good, don't worry. Andariel, I've come to put an end to you and the other evils." "Lile, we've been looking for you, ever since your staff was found back at the desert outpost. The Outcast has not stopped searching for you." "H-he… hasn't? Perhaps I judged him too quickly?" Lile seems to stare off into space for a minute and then puts her mask back on. The blood stops flowing. "Thanks for the information Andariel, but you know, it's your fault the Chosen One ever came to be. If you hadn't killed my apprentice, none of this would be happening. Idiot." Lile smirks slightly and throws her dagger as fast as she can at Andariel. It goes straight through body. "Remember this, Andariel? "Poison is quite amazing, eh?" "Lile laughs and disappears. Slater stares with confusion then, at the hole in Andariel. She begins to puke up blood and groans heavily. "You'll…fail Slater…you don't have a chance!" She coughs up one last wave of blood before the hole begins getting bigger, eating away her body. Her skin slowly disintegrates as the acidic poison makes its way through Andariel's body. Within minutes, Andariel is gone, leaving nothing but a puddle of her blood and Lile's dagger. Slater walks over and grabs it, avoiding the blade and the blood, finding it strangely dry. "The evils and Lile will probably kill each other before I even find another of them." Slater laughs slightly and continues his search for the evils.

---

"Outcast! I have returned." As she yells this out, she removes her mask and places it on a nearby table. "Ah, Lile, it seems you lost faith in me for a bit. Your face is covered in dried blood." The Outcast washes the blood from Lile's face with a wet cloth. "Yes. By the way, I'm afraid Andariel won't be coming back." The Outcast laughs a little. "Testing new poisons again?" Lile nods. "Yes, but I got a little carried away, there's nothing left of Andariel for you to resurrect. "Lile, you underestimate me." The Outcast waves his arm slightly and Andariel appears in front of them. "Welcome back Andariel, it seems your poison is no match for Lile's, eh?" The Outcast laughs. "Very funny, brother, and Lile, you're lucky I'm not the type to hold a grudge." Lile quirks an eyebrow at Andariel. "_You_ don't hold grudges? Yeah right. Not that it'd matter either way. The Outcast sighs. "Andariel, please just wait in your room, I get the feeling the rest of our brothers and sisters will be joining us soon enough."


	9. Act VII

Slater stands up after his short rest in the desert. It's no longer nighttime and it's easier to see what's going on. He looks to his side and sees a statue of a druid. He sees a pedestal next to it. On top of this pedestal is a plaque. Slater reads it aloud. "Am I frozen here for all time? Betrayal? Give me something once held by my master. Feeling her nearby again will finally release me from this prison!" Slater reads it over to himself multiple times. "What?" Slater turns away from the statue of the druid only to find another statue. This statue depicts Lile, reaching out towards the druid, with a sad look on her face. "What is this doing here?" Slater glances back and forth between the two statues. "Oh, I think I get it! Perhaps if I…?" Slater places the dagger that Lile had left behind onto the pedestal nearby the druid's statue. The stone begins to crumble and the stone falls to the ground to reveal a real, living, druid. "What? Where am I?" Slater stares at the druid for a moment. "Hm, do I have a new ally?"

---

"Outcast, earlier you said that your brothers and sisters would be here soon. Are you calling them back from their posts?" "No." "So, why will they be here?" "A new enemy of ours has arisen to aid the chosen one. I'll be forced to revive my brothers and sisters eventually and this is where I plan to do it." "Who is this new ally?" "Well, all I can say at the moment is that you knew him well, even before you met the previous "Chosen One"." "Before I met Slater? Now that I think about it, I can't remember much of anything from before we accidentally released you. Other than when we battled at my home city in the desert of Lut Gohlein." "I wouldn't expect you to. The infection given to you from here in Hell wiped all of your previous memories unrelated to the evils." "That reminds me, when do we begin infecting the humans?" "I'm going to be going tonight. However, I need you to stay here and protect the fortress. Don't allow Andariel to give you any trouble. Oh, and please, try not to kill her again." Lile pouts. "I'll try."

---

"Who are you?" "I'm Slater, a necromancer, you?" The druid stares at Slater. "I don't remember." "How did you get here?" "I don't even know where _here_ is." "Well then, I assume you wouldn't mind joining me on my quest?" "I don't see why not. Assuming it's not a quest of evil." "No, it's as pure as a quest can be, I assure you." "Well then, it's nice to meet you Slater. The druid jumps down from the platform the statue had been placed upon. "So, what is this quest you're on?" Slater explains what his quest is as well as the meaning of being the chosen one. "Interesting. You've only defeated one of these eight evils so far?" "Correct." "I guess we have a long way to go then. Do you know where any of the others are?" "No, but I was heading towards the portal to Hell in Kurast before my ship was destroyed." "What for?" "If we're lucky, we might find Lile there. If she's defeated, the Outcast will be the only huge threat to my quest left. However, I can't allow you to enter Hell with me. That's the same way Lile became tainted with evil." "Ok, I will follow you to the portal but I will remain on the other side. Why won't you be tainted though?" "Only the Chosen One is immune to the infection."

---

Lile sits on the stone chair the Outcast had crafted for her. "its so boring being alone." Lile is knocked onto the ground as she finishes her sentence. She quickly jumps up to find who was responsible. "So weak without your poison, aren't you Lile." Lile glares evilly at Andariel. "You're lucky that I promised the Outcast I wouldn't kill you. I could've killed you twenty times over by now." "Yeah? Prove it." Andariel jumps at Lile and misses entirely as Lile steps out of the way. Lile gives Andariel a kick in the neck. Andariel flies face first into the floor. "Get up fool, you're begin stupid.." Andariel jumps up and slashes at Lile, who once again sides steps. This time, Lile kick Andariel in the back and sends her flying into a wall. "Are you done yet?" Andariel turns around and looks at Lile, her face bleeding from the impact of the wall. "Fine. You win. For now." Andariel leaves the room and Lile chuckles slightly. "Well, that brightened up my day."

---

"Ah Kurast, the city that will be the first to feel the wrath of the infection." A man runs up to the Outcast. "Welcome Sir, are you new h-?" The man falls to the ground with a gash in his arm." "No. I've been here many times, before you were even born." The mistress walks up to the Outcast. "I'm guessing that you're not trying to blend in?" The Outcast smirks. "No. This is the first town that will be facing the infection." The mistress seems to bounce a little with excitement. "Ah, so it's finally beginning! What about the chosen one? How's he progressing?" "He has revived a powerful hero and has had Lile's help to defeat Andariel." The mistress seems to lose her joyfulness and sighs. "Lile changes sides so often, I forget whether or not I'm supposed to fight her!" "Oh well, she's back on our side for the time being." The mistress seems to be joyful again as she remembers the previous topic. "Well, I suppose we should infect the town now?" "No. I will infect the town. _You_ will remain at your post. I have a feeling that the chosen one will be arriving here soon. Even if _does_ get past you and Mephisto, he'll be greatly disappointed." The mistress appears heartbroken. "But I've waited centuries for this!" The Outcast sighs. "Very well, you infect the city, but if Slater gets close and you aren't paying attention, you will pay dearly." The assassin becomes very excited. "Thank you so much, brother!" The assassin runs off, leaving the Outcast to watch her post.


	10. Act VIII

The druid and Slater are sailing East on their newly built boat. They're once again on the sea of the Shinsho. "Druid, I'm worried. The last time I was here, my ship was destroyed and everyone onboard except me was killed. That's how I came to be in Lut Gohlein." The druid stares out towards the ocean and sees a huge flock of seagulls. "No! Not again! It's the Shinsho!" The druid remains motionless, staring out to the sea. A tentacle rises up from beneath the water and swings at the boat. Slater runs away from the tentacle's target. It smashes through the storage room. "Druid, we're doomed!" The druid begins shaking slightly and a red aura appears around him. Not once has he looked away from the sea. "That's the same aura that Lile gave off back in Lut Gohlein!" Slater stares at the druid in amazement. The druid becomes a werewolf and jumps off of the ship. "Druid! What are you doing?" The druid disappears under the sea and then reappears where the tentacle meets the water. He bites down on the tentacle and it slowly turns a bright red color before exploding. Apparently the tentacle hadn't been all that exploded because a wave of blood came from where the Shinsho had been and splashes on deck. Slater stares in amazement. "He defeated the Shinsho with one bite? He's a lot stronger than I thought!" The druid seems to appear on deck out of nowhere. "So Slater, what was that about us being doomed?" The druid laughs and Slater continues to stare at him in amazement. "Don't celebrate yet! You've killed my pet, there's no way that I'll allow you safe passage to Kurast!" Diablo seems to fall from the sky and lands on the ship. "Diablo! He's one of the prime evils druid, be careful!" The druid smirks. "There's no need."

---

Lile sighs slightly. "When will the Outcast be back? Only Andariel and me are in the entire fortress. How boring!" Lile walks towards the door. "Andariel, I'm going slaughtering near the ruins!" Andariel walks in. "Didn't the Outcast tell you to stay here and protect the fortress?" Lile turns around to look at Andariel. "You're not my mother. Besides, can't you handle it for at least an _hour_?" Andariel grumbles. "You're not leaving me here alone to do _your_ job!" "Oh come on, be a dear, please?" Lile clenches her fists and begins walking towards Andariel with an evil look on her face. "Ok, Ok! I'll do it!" Lile smirks. "Thanks." Lile walks out of the room, leaving Andariel standing alone and annoyed.

---

"Mistress, I'm not sure if Slater will be reaching Kurast, Diablo has left his post and attacked him on the sea." The mistress runs and jumps over corpses to reach the Outcast. "What? I wanted to kill him!" The Outcast shrugs. "Oh well. Cross your fingers that Diablo fails then." "Don't worry. I will." "Well good luck if you do fight him, I must move on to my next town to infect more of these humans." The mistress crosses her arms. "I don't need luck to defeat him." "Don't be too cocky, it may be your downfall." The mistress looks strangely at the Outcast. "You overestimate him Outcast." "Whatever you say mistress, whatever you say." The Outcast disappears, leaving the mistress feeling slightly annoyed.

---

"What do you mean there's no need?" The druid stares at Diablo. "He's weaker than his little "pet" was. This should be easy." Diablo rushes at the two of them. He knocks Slater through a nearby wall while the druid simply sidesteps out of the way. The druid sighs. "Diablo, picking on the chosen one while he's still weak? You should know better than that!" Diablo turns away from where Slater had gone through the wall to face the druid. "It's better to be safe and kill him early than wait and give him a chance to actually cut me." Slater jumps out from behind Diablo and hits him in the back of the head with a large wooden plank, which breaks on contact with Diablo. "Chosen one, just stay down!" Slater stands up. "I won't give up. You only got me earlier because I wasn't expecting your attack. It won't happen again." Diablo laughs at Slater. "You honestly believe that you can defeat me?" The druid shakes his head and sighs. "Diablo, just shut up!" The druid runs at Diablo while transforming back into his werewolf form and slashes at Diablo. He leaves a deep gash in his chest." Diablo looks down at the hole. "Two evils in a row? Defeated in a single hit? What is this? I can feel my strength draining!" Diablo falls to his knees, breathing heavily. "At least you aren't like Lile, she'd keep me alive for days to torture me." Diablo laughs slightly before the druid chops his head off. Slater stares at Diablo's body. "You're a very powerful ally, druid." The druid laughs. "I know." Suddenly, the boat shakes violently, it had hit a mountain of rocks. The boat begins breaking to pieces as it sinks into the water. "No! Not again!" The druid stares wide-eyed at the nearing water. "It's strange. I can defeat an evil in a single swipe, yet this water makes me fear for my life." "Druid, try to stay with me after we hit the water, please!" The two sink into the water at the same time, along with the remains of their ship.

---

"I hate Lile! Leaving me here to do _her_ job! Me, an evil, being ordered around by a half demon! I can't believe this!" Andariel leans against a wall. "I'd love to be out there slaughtering the weak spirits that come to Hell, but no! I stay here and follow my orders." Andariel sighs. "I swear that I'll be the one to kill her."

---

"Mistress, I'm back, I'm here to tell you that Diablo has failed." The mistress walks over to the Outcast with a large smile on her face. "Ah, so I get to fight the chosen one next?" "I'm not sure." The mistress gives a confused look. "What do you mean?" "His ship crashes and both him and his ally went under. I'm unsure of where either of them went." The mistress sighs. "Is he even alive any more?" The Outcast thinks for a moment. "Well, only two evils were defeated, meaning he's not able to die yet. However, it _is_ possible that he's stuck at the bottom of the ocean." The mistress turns away from the Outcast. "Whatever, at least I can just lay around doing whatever I feel like." "Alright, good bye mistress, I'm leaving again. I've got to check on the fortress in Hell."


	11. Act IX

Slater awakes underneath the water, his pants are caught between some rocks. He quickly gets them loose and swims to the surface. The water is pure black and there's no sign whatsoever of the druid. Slater looks around and sees a dock. He climbs up and looks around. A man is staring at the ground, not far off. "Excuse me, sir? Where are we?" The man continues to stare at the ground and Slater walks over to him. "Sir-?" Slater sees a long gash in the man's arm. He reaches towards the man. "S-sir?" The man swings his arm at Slater, knocking him to the ground. The man begins to walk slowly towards Slater. "Something's wrong here!" Slater jumps up from the ground and begins to back away. He turns around to run but finds that he's now surrounded by mindless villagers, just standing around him. He prepares to attack. "Stand back minions." The mistress appears through the crowd of villagers. "So, Slater, we finally meet." "Mistress of Pain." "I was beginning to worry I wouldn't be able to fight you, you were taking so long, but you're finally here." "So, you were hoping to die soon?" "You're confident of yourself, aren't you chosen one?" "Mistress, you are weak! Without surprise, you are nothing!" "We shall see chosen one." The mistress lifts her blades and Slater readies his wand. "Let's go!"

---

"Lile, are you here?" The Outcast walks into the fortress. "No, she's not." Andariel stands up from a nearby chair. "She's never here. She left about the time you did and never came back!" "Andariel, did you do something to here?" The Outcast backs Andariel into a wall. "No! I'm telling the truth, please believe me!" The Outcast backs away slightly. "If I find out that you're lying, I'll make sure that you die for good." Andariel runs from the room in fright. A few seconds later, the fortress door opens. "Ah, Outcast, I knew I felt you returning home." The Outcast turns and sees Lile. "Lile! I guess Andariel was telling the truth. Where have you been?" "Picking on all of the new souls that enter Hell. I noticed that they sopped coming recently though." "That's because the infection is complete. None will come here anymore unless the infection is reversed." "It can be reversed?" "For me to have complete control over the entire continent is impossible. So, I had to give partial control to the other evils, and to you. We have the majority of the army because we are the most powerful, making it easier for us to control them. Now, if the evil in control of the infected people is defeated, the infection will be reversed. Once a person has been reversed, they can't be infected again. So, if somehow, everyone was reversed to normal. The only way we could infect the world again, would be to wait for all of the current people to die off, and then infect their children. Oh! I almost forgot, I must revive Diablo before his portion awakes."

---

The mistress rushes at Slater. He attempts to back away but is blocked by the infected ones behind him. The assassin hits Slater in the shoulder with her blade and knocks his backwards into the mindless villagers. They begin to crawl onto him, hoping the taste the blood from his shoulder. Slater somehow pushes them away and crawls back into the circle of zombies with the mistress. "Lucky shot!" "Oh, I bet. Chosen one, you're doomed." The mistress rushes Slater once again. He does a flip over her and kicks her into her minions. Having a domino effect, a good amount of the zombies fall over. "Try again, mistress!" The mistress stands up and glares at Slater. "I hope you enjoyed that, you won't hit me again." "Whatever." The mistress creates a duplicate of herself. Her double runs to the left of Slater while she runs to the right of him. The mistress and her clone run in circles around Slater, slowly closing in." "KNOCK IT OFF! POISON NOVA!" Poison bolts shoot off of Slater's body in every direction. The mistress' double disappears while the mistress herself falls to the ground, breathing heavily. "Looks like I win, mistress." Slater pulls a dagger from his boot and slits the mistress' throat. Suddenly his attention returns to his shoulder. "No! I think there might've been some poison on her blade…!" Slater falls face first onto the ground and falls unconscious.

---

"Welcome back mistress." The Outcast laughs slightly. "I told you that you were underestimating him!" "Shut up, Outcast, I have no time for you. I must get back to my post. "No mistress, you need to stay here. We must all be here if Slater does manage to find us." The mistress groans. "Well, is Andariel here?" "Of course, as I said before, she was the first one down." "Well, I'll be speaking with her if you want me then." The mistress leaves the room and Diablo takes her place. "How're you doing Diablo?" "I still can't believe the chosen one's ally defeated me with only one hit!" "Don't worry about it Diablo, his ally is most likely dead. After defeating you, his ship went down." Diablo laughs heartily. "Why didn't you tell me sooner?" "Slipped my mind I guess."

---

Slater wakes up, staring into a man's face. "The zombies are still here!" He attempts to jump up but finds himself being held down. "Sir! Please, stop!" Slater stops resisting. "You can talk?" "Sir, you were poisoned. We found you in the village. You're lucky we found you when we did!" "Trust me, I wouldn't have died. However, that poison would have slowed me down greatly. Thank you very much for your assistance." The villagers let go of Slater and allow him to stand. "Well, what brings you here? This village hasn't attracted many visitors lately." "I'm searching for the eight evils." "Sir! Please lay back down, you're talking crazy!" "No, it's alright. I'm the chosen one. I've already defeated three of the eight evils. I only need five more." The villagers bow to Slater. "Very well then, chosen one. Good luck with your journey, but please don't return. In the event that the evils follow you here…" "Thank you, I understand." Slater is guided through Kurast, to the exit of the village, which leads into the jungle. "This is where we say good bye chosen one." The villagers go back into town and leave Slater alone in the jungle. "Well, I guess I'm going to the Durance of Hate."

---

"Outcast, if the chosen one if able to defeat all of the evils once, what makes you think he won't be able to do it a second time?" "Isn't it obvious Lile? If he was struggling to defeat us one at a time, how would he defeat us all at once? Not to mention, you'll be here helping us. There's no way the chosen one can defeat us all at once!" Lile smiles. "I guess you're right. I just hope that we get a chance to fight with him."

---

"Mephisto! I'm here! It's your turn to die!" Mephisto laughs happily. "So, the chosen one has made it to my lair, and he thinks _I'm_ going to die?" Slater rushes towards Mephisto but is knocked back, halfway over the edge into the lava pit. He tries to get up but Mephisto is suddenly holding him down. "Let me go!" Out of nowhere, the druid appears behind Mephisto. Before anything happens, Slater finds himself in the world stone chamber. There, a portal can be seen, in the same spot that the original "chosen one" had died. "She didn't leave behind a corpse or a skeleton or anything?" Slater walks forward and enters the portal. Slater then awakes, finding himself tied to a tree. "What a weird dream. Wait a second, what's going on?" Pygmies surround the tree that Slater is tied to immediately. The leader, a shaman, speaks in an annoying, high-pitched voice. "Human, what are you doing in our jungle?" Slater wishes he could cover his ears, but his hands remain tied tightly to the tree. "I'm here to kill Mephisto." "You come to our jungle, walk through our villages and now, expect to kill our god?" "Your god? Why on earth would you worship Mephisto?" "He is a good god. He provides us with many humans for sacrifice." "Sacrifice? To who?" "Are you not paying attention, human? To Mephisto!" "What? Does that even make sense? He gives you humans to sacrifice to himself?" Slater has no idea what the pygmies are talking about. "Well, anyway, how about you let me down and sacrifice me?" "Don't be silly, the chosen one can't be sacrificed, he can't die!" Slater realizes Mephisto must've warned the pygmies of him coming. "Instead, we will deliver you to Mephisto, and he will destroy you himself!" "Huh?" "Are you deaf human?" "No-" Slater is knocked out with a rock.

---

"It seems Mephisto's pygmies have captured Slater. I believe it's over." Lile frowns. "What? I wanted to fight him!" "Well, I'd say Slater has a one in a million chance of surviving this. He's tied up and unconscious. Mephisto would have to make a very stupid move for Slater's body not to be destroyed." Lile smirks. "Well, in the case, I'd say Slater has a ninety-nine percent chance of escaping." The Outcast laughs slightly.

---

Slater awakes, hanging from the ceiling over the lava pit in Mephisto's lair. "This looks bad." Mephisto appears in front of Slater and looks up at him. "Ah, chosen one, it seems your little journey has come to its end." "Let me down from here!" Mephisto smiles. "Alright." Mephisto prepares to shoot a ball of ice at the rope. "Ah! Ok, I'll stay up here!" "Ah, good. I _was_ hoping to torture you a bit longer." Slater stares down and the lava and begins thinking to himself. "Is it over? Have I failing my quest? How could I fail where the previous had succeeded?" Slater hears Mephisto give a loud scream and he looks up. "Mephisto? What just happened? Is anyone there?" Slater feels someone untying him from behind. Immediately after being untied, Slater is thrown to the ground. "Hurry, through the portal!" Without thinking, Slater runs to the portal. Mephisto's mangled body lies beside it. Ignoring it for the time being, Slater rushes through the portal.

---

"Well, that was unexpected." "What is it, Outcast?" The Outcast glances at Lile. "The chosen one has escaped Mephisto, and it had nothing to do with stupidity." Lile stares wide eyed at the Outcast. "Then, how was it that he escaped?" The Outcast looks at the ground. "His ally didn't die. If they're able to join forces again, we may be in trouble. I'll leave it to you Lile. He's in Mephisto's lair, waiting for the chosen one to return." "Why doesn't he just follow the chosen one through the portal?" The Outcast smirks. "Because he doesn't want to be infected in Hell." The Outcast begins laughing loudly and Lile joins in soon after.

---

The druid sits in Mephisto's lair, watching Mephisto's body, to be sure he's really dead. "Slater said to wait here, but what if he needs my help?" The druid begins to pace back and forth through the room, still watching Mephisto's body out of the corner of his eye. "Although, if I entered the portal, I'd become infected. I'd become another minion of the evils, and another obstacle for Slater." Suddenly, a voice is heard from behind the druid. "Well put druid. However, your friend is not in Hell, _but_ I'll send _you_ there anyway!" The druid turns around just in time to see a foot in his face, he flies back and falls to the ground. Once his vision clears, he finds who had hit him. "Lile?" Lile looks strangely at the druid. "How do you know my name?" The druid stands up. "Master! Do you not recognize me?" Lile looks annoyed. "No, _boy_. I'm no one's master." She punches him in the face and sends him flying into the wall. He stands. "Fine, master. I see your betrayal continues. Make your move!" Lile runs at the druid with her staff raised. Just as she's about to hit, the druid transforms into a wolf and appears behind her. He then elbows her sharply in the back, sending her to the ground. She stands quickly and trips the druid with her staff. "Frozen orb!" The ice bounces off of the druid. He stands. Lile kicks him through the portal, which closes behind him. "For another day." Lile slowly walks out of the room, mumbling to herself.


	12. Act X

"What's this? This looks nothing like the Hell from my visions." Slater looks at his surrounding. "Wait, I know where I am! This is the rogue encampment! I'm back where the original "Chosen One" began! How can this be?" Slater looks around the camp, confused. "I must get back to Kurast and figure out what has happened!" Slater runs from the encampment, as the druid appears where he had been standing. "This looks nothing like I imagined. I thought Hell would be darker and more evil looking." A rogue runs quickly up next to the druid. "Sir, please help me! A demon appeared in our encampment and has killed all of the rogues but myself! I beg of you for assistance!" The druid stares blankly at the rogue for a half a second and kicks her in the stomach and sends her flying backwards. "Get back Hell spawn! I won't become one of you!" The rogue lies on the ground, blood leaking from her mouth. Rogues quickly surround the druid. They make a circle around the druid and point their spears at him. The druid raises his arms to show his surrender. Although he could take each of them easily, he hopes to be brought to their masters, the evils. "Do what you want hell spawn, but as soon as I get a chance, you're all going to die!" The rogues lock the druid up and put him into a cage before placing the cage into a wagon. The rogues seem pleased as they begin leading the wagon from the encampment.

---

Lile enters the fortress. "Why did you allow him to escape?" Lile shrugs. "I don't know, I didn't feel like fighting I guess." "WHAT? YOU'RE LYING TO ME! YOU ALWAYS FEEL LIKE FIGHTING!" Lile stares evilly at the Outcast. "Don't you dare yell at me again." "DO YOU THINK YOU CAN SCARE _ME_?" THE MOST POWERFUL BEING TO EVER EXIST?" "Yes, because you're not the most powerful. I am." Lile kicks the Outcast in the stomach and he falls to his knees. Andariel had watched all of this from the doorway. She laughs slightly. "If they keep arguing like this, I may have a chance to split them up and kill Lile for good!"

---

Slater arrives at the same cave that the Outcast had been sealed inside of. "This is where it all began." Just before Slater is able to enter the cave, he hears movement from behind him. He quickly hides in some nearby bushes. Soon after, he sees some rogues. These are followed by a wagon and finally, after that, are more rogues. Slater decides that he should follow them, wondering who or what may be in the cage. He follows them through the cave, to the monastery, through the jails, past the catacombs, into Andariel's chamber and up to her throne. Here, they finally stop. "What are they doing here? Andariel has already been killed!" They take the cage from the wagon and place it onto the throne. The cage seems to begin sinking. "Hm, a secret passage?" Slater quickly runs past the rogues and jumps onto the cage. He's then lowered into a hidden chamber before the rogues are able to stop him. "Where am I now?" "Slater? Is that you?" "Huh? Who wants to know? Where are you?" "I'm the druid, I'm inside of this cage." "Hold on, I'll try to open it." "There's no need." The druid breaks the cage to pieces. "I wasn't trapped, the rogues were bringing me to their master, which I assume is one of the evils." "Well, if they brought you here, then it's definitely one of the evils. However, that would mean that the rogues were infected like the people in the Kurast…" The druid looks panicked. "Oh no! That reminds me! Now that I'm in Hell, I'll be infected!" "Druid, you haven't realized? We aren't in Hell, the portal was somehow redirected to the rogue encampment." "Oh, oops then. I think I may have killed a rogue when I came out of the portal. If they weren't infected…oh my." Slater sighs. "No druid, as I just said, these rogues have also been infected. The evils have discovered a way to infect humans. This turns them into mindless followers. However, I think that the stronger the evil is, the more they can control at once. It seems that these rogues are much smarter than the villagers in Kurast had been. The ones in Kurast did nothing but hunger for blood!" Suddenly, interrupting their conversation, a voice is heard. "Ah, I sense a new sacrifice. Ah, two in fact!" Nihlathak then turns the corner and sees both the druid and Slater. "Hm, no sacrifice after all?" Nihlathak frowns. "Chosen one, I see that we finally have a chance for battle." A loud noise comes from behind. The rogues stand there aiming their bows at Slater. "Don't think of running, I want to be sure _I'm _the one to finish you off." Slater smirks. "Come on, I remember your battle from my visions. You're nothing without corpses!" Nihlathak laughs heartily. "You think you know everyone's weakness don't you Slater? A necromancer isn't limited to summoning skeletons and blowing up corpses. You're a necromancer yourself, you should know that by now." Nihlathak creates a spear of bone from out of nowhere, tipped with a green substance. "Poison and bone skills are just as effective!" Nihlathak begins sending waves of poisoned spears at Slater and the druid. They both continuously dodge them. They both continuously dodge them, with some very close calls. This goes on until they find themselves backed against the rogues. Nihlathak creates another spear, but holds it this time. "Hold back the druid for me." The rogues all grab the druid, he doesn't resist. Nihlathak walks up to Slater and places the spear to his throat. "Now, you realize, with your throat impaled, even if you _do_ revive continuously, you _will_ die just as many?" Nihlathak laughs slightly with a smirk. Slater stares evilly up at him. "Go ahead! Even if you do kill me, you will be defeated in some way or another. Someone will rise to take my place! Eventually, all eight evils will be defeated, it's inevitable!" Nihlathak looks angrily down at Slater before raising his spear to thrust it into his neck. However, before he's able to, the druid pulls himself free of the rogue's grasps and knocks it from Nihlathak's hands. The druid then grabs Nihlathak's arms and pulls them behind his back. "Slater, finish him!" Slater jumps up and grabs Nihlathak's spear. "Die, demon!" He thrusts the poisoned spear through Nihlathak's chest. He dies instantly.

---

The Outcast chuckles. "Welcome home brother!" Nihlathak glares at the Outcast. "The chosen one's ally is strong! I nearly had a spear in the chosen one's neck!" The Outcast laughs a little again. "Nihlathak, you'll have another chance. Or at least, I assume you will. At the rate the chosen one is moving, he'll reach the fortress soon." Nihlathak sighs. "But I was so close!" Nihlathak walks from the room unhappily and Lile enters a few moments later. "So, Nihlathak's been defeated too? How many evils does that leave? Two?" The Outcast thinks for a moment. "Well, if you don't include me, yes. All but one has been returned here. I expect Baal will be the last until the chosen one reaches the fortress." "Why, what of the other one?" The Outcast laughs. "She's still being "reeducated"." Lile smirks. "It's taking her long enough."

---

"Slater! We've cornered the prime evils, they're in their fortress!" Slater raises her claws and stares at them for a moment before smirking. "The fight is nearly won Andariel. Get the Mistress of Pain and Nihlathak so we can begin the final assault." Andariel runs to the other side of the fortress to get the other lesser evils. Slater stares at the main gate of the fortress. "It will soon be over. The prime evils will be defeated and the lesser evils will reign supreme in Hell!" Slater awakes in a chamber. She tries to get up but remembers that she's been chained down. She feels her wrists burning where the Outcast had made the purple scars. She feels anger rising within her. Her eyes turn bright yellow and her pupils thin into slits. She lets out a loud scream before becoming unconscious again.

---

The druid drops Nihlathak's lifeless body and helps Slater up to his feet. The rogues lay unconscious behind the two of them. The druid looks around the chamber. "So, how _do_ we get to Hell, if not from Kurast?" Slater thinks back, back to the vision before the fight with Mephisto. "There's a portal in the world stone chamber. Where Baal was killed. I think that may be the new entrance into Hell." The druid thinks for a moment. "How do we get there?" A loud voice is then heard for behind the two of them. "I can help you with that, chosen one." The two turn to find the angel. "How?" The angel smiles happily. "I will open a portal directly to the world stone chamber for you. It's as you. It's as easy as that." Slater smiles happily. "We would eternally be in your debt, angel." The angel rips open a portal and the two enter it.

---

Lile walks into the room holding her head. "Outcast! I can't stand that screaming! What's taking so long?" The Outcast laughs. "It'll be over soon Lile, she's returning to her original form and regaining her memories." Lile sighs. "Well, she'd better hurry up!"

---

Slater walks up to Diablo, having him cornered. "Diablo, our oldest brother, the druid, is getting too strong for his own good. He will soon attempt to control us all if something isn't done soon." Diablo shrugs. "And, what do you expect to _do_ about it?" Slater smirks. "I've already gotten the other five evils on my side. There is an ancient spell known by the fallen. It could keep something as strong as an evil sealed for eternity. I want you to bring our brother to the fallen's cave and we will be rid of him." Diablo smirks now. "I'm behind you entirely Slater." Slater awakes within the room. She feels her muscles enlarging and her skin ripping. Her fingernails elongate into long black claws. She once again lets out a loud scream before falling unconscious. "Ok Slater, the "Outcast" is on his way. We've tricked him into wanting to attack you." Slater smirks. "Well done. You may want to leave, the last thing you'll want is to get caught in this fight." Time seems to jump forward. The Outcast enters the room Slater's in and the fallen surround them both. "Slater! You will be the first to face my wrath." Slater smiles happily as the fallen begin to chant. "It doesn't seem that you'll have the time, brother." Slater turns to walk from the room. However, the Outcast immediately has her on the ground. Slater lies halfway between the ritual circle and the exit. "Let go!" Slater struggles to get free, but it's already too late. The Outcast seems to sink into the ground and pulls Slater with him. Time jumps forward again. The fallen are gone and Slater lies in the middle of the room. No longer a demon, but human. She awakes and looks around the room. "What? Where am I? Better yet…_who_ am I?" Slater awakes for the final time. The chains holding her down burst as her muscles get larger. Her flesh rips off, leaving behind a scaly hide. Long, sharp, white spikes burst from within her. Slater smirks. "Ah, I've finally returned.


	13. Act XI

Slater and the druid step out of the portal and into the world stone chamber. Baal is standing there directly in front of them. "Welcome chosen one, to your death." Slater quirks an eyebrow. "If you think that you're going to stop me, you're insane. Not after I've come this far." Slater can see the portal to Heel directly behind Baal. The druid laughs. "He's right you know. Besides, the Outcast killed you in a single shot the last time." Baal frowns. "The Outcast is stronger than both of you combined. Of course he killed me!" Slater smirks. "Well, perhaps it'll take us two shots then." Slater runs at Baal with his dagger raised. The druid follows suit. Slater slits Baal's throat as the druid cuts him through the chest. "Yup, two shots." Baal falls dead onto the ground. "Ok druid, I'm on my own from here. No matter what happens, DO _NOT_ enter the portal." The druid smiles. "Yes Slater, I understand. Good luck." The druid leaves through the portal back to Andariel's chamber while Slater enters the one to Hell.

---

"Lile, Slater has reached the outside of the fortress. I'd appreciate it if you took care of him." Lile gives the Outcast a strange look. "What about your brothers and sisters?" The Outcast shrugs. "From everything they've done since I revived them, I honestly haven't gotten to the point of trusting them again. I'd prefer it if you took care of him instead. Meanwhile, I'll stay here and help your apprentice get the rest of her memory back." Lile shrugs. "Ok, I suppose, if that's what you want." "It is." Lile stands and walks from the room.

---

Slater walks through the main gate of the fortress. "Well, that was strangely easy." Andariel appears in front of him seconds later. "Chosen one." Slater gets into a battle stance. "Andariel! So the Outcast has revived you already?" Andariel smiles. "Chosen one, I have an offer for you. I can help you defeat Lile." Slater quirks an eyebrow. "Why should I trust the likes of you?" "The Outcast, he trusts that woman more than his own family. I suppose I'm partly to blame for that. However, him doing this destroys our honor, he believes that she's more powerful than all seven other evils combined. I want to prove my worth to my brother." Slater sighs. "Very well, but one wrong move and you're dead."

---

"Hello Outcast." The Outcast smirks. "Hello Slater. This is the first time I've seen you in your true form since we met in the fallen's cave." Slater laughs. "Yes brother, I'm sorry for that. You were growing in power and we all grew afraid of you." The Outcast laughs as well. "Yes Slater, I understand. Besides, it ended up being worse for you. You had the demon sucked right out of you. I'd rather be _dead_ than become a human!" Slater sighs. "That's true." "Anyways, I've seen the future Slater, and it's important that you do as I say or we will all be killed." "What? What is it?" The Outcast stares directly into Slater's eyes. "I need you to leave to the surface, and you must find a place to hide. You must remain there for a thousand years. You must do _nothing_ to cause you to be found by _anyone_. If you do this, we will survive." Slater is unsure of how this will help. "Well, Ok. I'll do it to make up for what I did to you." The Outcast bows. "Thank you Slater." Slater turns and exits the fortress through a portal to the surface.

---

"Slater, do you remember your visions? When Diablo was released by Lile?" Slater thinks back for a moment and then nods. "Yes, he had been sealed down here. However, when Lile opened each of the three seals, he was released." "Exactly. You must use the seals on Lile." Slater thinks again. "The seal will only affect the evils." Andariel shakes her head. "No, it absorbs evil. Evils are pure evil, and so, are absorbed entirely. In Lile's case, she'll become untainted. Long enough for her to willingly kill herself so as to not become tainted again." "Are you assuming or are you sure?" Andariel shrugs. "She _will_ become untainted, but whether she will kill herself or not is uncertain." "Seems like a big risk for you." Andariel smirks. "But not for you." "That's true." With these words, Lile enters the room with Diablo's seal in it. "Ohhh chosen one! I know you're in here!" Andariel turns to Slater. "I'll distract her, hit the seals as quickly as possible!" Andariel jumps down from the ledge she had been standing on. "Lile! I want to continue our fight." Lile laughs to herself for a moment. "I'm busy Andariel, I must destroy the chosen one." Slater begins running to the first seal with as much stealth as he can manage. Andariel blocks Lile's view of him. "No! You will fight me first!" Lile sighs. "Very well." Andariel backs up to the center of the room, where the seal becomes fully activated. Slater activates the first seal and begins running for the next one. Lile runs at Andariel. "Let's make this quick." Lile hits Andariel in the face with her fist. Andariel stumbles backwards. Andariel immediately counterattacks with her huge claws. Lile moves to the side, avoiding the claw entirely. "Haven't you learned yet Andariel? You're no match for me." Slater activates the second seal. Lile grabs Andariel by her neck. "Are you ready to die again Andariel?" Lile slowly brings her dagger to Andariel's neck and smirks. The Outcast rushes into the room. "Lile! Move!" Slater activates the third and final seal. The room begins to shake and the center begins to glow brightly. "Andariel is sucked into the ground immediately. Lile stands there, unable to move. An apparent pure black cloud leaves Lile through her mouth and shoots through the floor. Slater watches all of this before looking again at the Outcast. "Lile! Are you alright?" Lile holds her head with one hand for a moment and wobbles slightly. She then lowers her hand and glares at the Outcast, steadying herself. "Outcast, for the first time since I had been in Lut Gohlein with my apprentice, I finally feel just perfect. You have controlled me for far too long!" The Outcast looks worried. "Lile, what of the plans? We were to be the rulers of Hell!" Lile smirks. "The plans have changed. Slater, I want you to leave, I will take care of this myself." Slater stares at Lile for a moment. "But…I-" "Do as I say!" Slater runs from the room as Lile and the Outcast begin their fight. The entire building shakes continuously, magma shoots from the floors at random intervals and Slater remains trapped inside. He runs as fast his legs will allow him and finally sees the main gate ahead. The ceiling collapses in front of it. "No!" Slater tries as hard as hard as he can to remove the heavy stones from the exit. It's already getting well past too late; the fortress is sinking beneath the lava and there's no longer anything preventing the magma from leaking in. With no other idea of how to escape, he begins running back to Lile.


	14. War of Infection:Epilogue

The Outcast gasps for breath after being hit in the stomach once again by Lile. "Lile, don't you see? If we continue like this, the fortress will sink and we'll all be killed! Join me again and you will be saved!" Lile frowns. "I would rather be dead at the center of the earth than to obey the likes of you, Outcast!" She rushes the Outcast and attempts to stab him in the face with her dagger. He grabs her by the wrist with both hands and manages to hold her there. She uses her free hand to punch him continuously in his chest. He quickly lets go of her and they both stumble slightly backwards. The walls begin to crumble. Slater rushes into the room. "Lile! The entire fortress is sinking! We'll all die if you continue on!" Lile frowns. "I knew that from the start Slater! That's why I told you to run!" Slater sighs and shakes his head with despair. "The entrance is blocked! There's no way out!" The magma begins to drip in through where the ceiling had been. The remaining five evils rush into the room. "Brother! What's going on here?" The Outcast lies powerless on the floor. Lile sit on the ground and closes her eyes. "Well Slater, you quest ends here I suppose. The magma begins to rise and Slater does what he can to reach higher ground. Lile sits in the magma, her armor keeping it away for the time being. The evils run from the room towards the main gate. The Outcast submerges entirely in the magma. "Lile! We can't just sit here! We must escape!" Lile sighs. "If we make an exit for ourselves, we will be making an exit for the evils." "But-!" Slater allows himself to fall to the ground, accepting his defeat. He lies there, waiting for his death. Suddenly, the surroundings seem to change. He looks around and finds himself in Zakarum. Lile is sitting in front of him. "What happened? How'd I get back into Zakarum?" Lile stands. "I'm not sure, but if the evils followed, we have work to do." Suddenly, the prophet of the Necromancers appears in front of them. "They haven't. Slater, your role in this quest has been completed. However, other will pick up where you left off, one thousand years from now." Slater stares at the prophet. "The evils are dead!" The prophet shakes his head slowly. "No. You failed to destroy one. Slater lives still. Without her defeat, the Outcast cannot be killed. He will escape from the magma again. In one thousand years." "But! -" "One thousand years." The prophet disappears in a puff of smoke. "Lile! We need to kill." Lile sighs. "The future can't be changed Slater, do as the prophet tells you." Lile walks away from Slater as he stares blankly at her.


End file.
